days until the election. tonight president trump and joe biden will hold competing town halls. that's good, isn't it? and united airlines posting a $1.8 billion net loss in the third quarter. we'll show you how the stock is reacting on this thursday, october 15th like tax day and also ides of october. and it is still 2020 "squawk box" begins right now. good morning, everybody. i'm becky quick along with joe kernen, andrew will be here in a moment we've been watching the u.s. equity futures at this hour and after two days in a row of losses for the markets, you are looking at a third day of red

arrows dow futures indicated down by about 260. we've seen down 300 this morning. nasdaq also down sharply down by 200 points and the s&p 500 down by about 37 so significant declines after two other days of losses also playing out in the treasury markets as well. if you want to take a look at what is happening there, yields have gone down, right now the ten year is yield iing below 0.% a lot of this has to do with renewed lockdowns in europe. let's get to karen cho who has more on what is happening there. >> thank you very much we are witnessing losses across the markets as we contend with more news flow around more severe restrictions. we've been hearing the last couple hour 24s that there may moves announced later on today,

reports from various media outlets suggesting that london will move to a tier two restrictions the london mayor has spoken suggesting that the health secretary will reveal the changes in the house of commons. no mingling between households currently there is a rule of six people and they can be from various households but the mayor is talking about 100 cases per 100,000 people and we'll soon reach that level, but a significant numbareas alr above that level and this highlights some of the pressure applied from the opposition labor party for a two week national lockdown that has been resisted so far and the ultimate decision lies with boris johnson but we already have liverpool on

the highest level of alert so pin oigs aubs oig and servins has been closed for the time being. and on the french market, there havements there of overnight curfews at 9:00 p.m. to 6:00 a.m. and the french market is responding to those restricti s restrictions bars and businesses have to shut at 9:00 p.m. sharp the president wants to get the level back to 3,000. and just on germany, we have had record cases there as well but roughly just over 6600 that means that there are some restrictions on so-called hot spots, but it is much higher than what i'm just talking about with the uk and in france, gathering will be limited to just ten people. and gatherings in private spaces can only have two households so the german stock market was down the most earlier, more than

3%, limiting some of the damage. but what we're witnessing is some of the worst selling we've seen since about the 21st of september. back to you. >> when you say lock down i go on, there are different it ragtss in differeragt iterations here in the united states, it meant that theaters were closed, restaurants were closed, people couldn't go to work unless they were deemed emergency officials. you are not necessarily talking about that level of lockdown, are you? >> well, the labor party has been suggesting that is required in london, the more severe restrictions, a national lockdown is required to two weeks as a circuit breaker as we continue to see infections spiraling. but that is not what we're talking about here because the government has been resisting such severe measures given that the uk economy was so hard hit by the severe lockdowns we had earlier in the year, an effort by the government to avoid those type of measures at this point so it does seem that what we'll see is just tighter

restrictions still localized level, but of course london, the capital city, that has severe implications if there are restrictions no mingling of households. and it would coincide with half term as many schools are shut for a one or two week break. >> karen, thank you very much. red arrows across the board there in europe and that is bleeding over into the futures here in the united states. >> andrew, good morning. is it just me or -- for me, i'm still surprised when i hear, all right, we're reclosing bars. it is like bars were open and you are wondering -- that is not -- i can't imagine >> you can go to a bar here. you have to be outside >> you have to be insane >> right, you have to be outside. i haven't been to one, but i've seen other people when i've

driven by. >> but part of the issue is that because of the lockdowns that they did pursue, you know, three, four months ago, they were actually able to put some of this to rest for a while. clearly not enough but that is what allowed people to go he back to bars. i'm not suggesting that that necessarily is the right move for us here. but it was partially because of the discipline that they had then that then allowed them to frankly become undisciplined now. >> this is the graphic representation of what you are saying right there this is this period that went through a lull, and seven be day rolling average of cases per million, and the point that the "journal" makes is that the eu, that metric, which is very important, the eu has now passed the united states on a rolling average on cases per million people so we've done a little bit better since there, coming down

here, but we almost met up there at a higher level. so we're in the middle we're in the middle of this. but just myself, i feel people around me, you know, there is apple straighter here and everyone -- there is a new espresso machine and if there is someone else on the elevator, i feel it. i'll take the next one it really is a weird feeling >> there are stairs. >> i come down the stairs sometimes. i let gravity -- gravity is my friend but in certain cases, it has not been my friend anyway, let's keep going >> meantime, let's talk about what is going on back here at home steve mnuchin speaking in washington, he says that he and house speaker nancy pelosi remain what he is saying is, quote, far apart on another covid-19 economic relief package, he says a deal would be hard to reach before the november 3 election. but he said that he would keep

trying and as president trump continues to champion his efforts in those negotiations we should tell you, the secretary is going to join us live at 8:30 a.m. eastern time this morning it is a conversation that you do not want to miss where we will probe and ask him about all of this and the state of play >> and part of a selloff on any given day, we look for reasons but things don't seem to be going so great there we'll see. it will be great to have him on to ask him he made some kind of comment about that the democrats are not ready to give anybody a win between now and the election and we'll need to ask him about that because i don't think that he had said that up to this point because he was holding out hope. and he wasn't going to say that because obviously -- >> because that poisons the well >> exactly but he said it >> and everybody else, all these other senators have said that, but he has never said that along these lines. >> and he has now.

united airlines reported a loss, $8.16 a share. but we need to remember -- that wouldn't be bad, that would be pretty good. but it is per share unfortunately in the third quarter. worse than the $7.53 loss analysts had expected. revenue roughly in line though we'll talk to scott kirby, he will join us in an exclusive interview at 8:40 a.m. eastern meantime, elon musk announcing the second price change now for the model s in a tweet yesterday. he said that the gauntlet has been thrown down and says the prophecy will be fulfilled, model s price changes to 679d #

# $69,420. a love of juvenile musehugh mory working the 420 into the purchase price this second cut coming after a start up led by a former tesla exec priced its sedan at $69,900. and you remember also the $420 price tag was also used for his efforts at one point to take the company private. or not >> yeah, i'm usually int juvenile hugh more, but enough already. anyway, shares of clouds computing service fastly are plunging this morning. the dough lcompany lowered its e because of geopolitical

uncertainty. tiktok accounts for about 20% of fastly's revenue you first six months of the year and that stock is down by 29% this morning. and i do have a question about this i know there was so much uncertainty surrounding tiktok, but you did it actually lower usage? there were threats to shut it down seems like maybe more people were downloading it. >> i don't understand it yet i'm open to being sold on how great it is, but so andrew, you have still not -- you've seen tiktok, but you haven't produced a tiktok, is that still -- >> i have not produced any tiktoks. i thinks answer to becky's question, it did both. in many ways, more exposure for tiktok but at the same time, a lot of the big influencers and maybe this was going to happen anyway, a lot of the big you influencers

set up shops independently on what is called now reels on instagram. so they are running both of their platforms oftentimes with the same content in both places. so to some degree instagram was a beneficiary of this whole back and forth. >> i get the instagram beings beneficiary. but were teens not using it because they were worry that the trump administration would shut it down? >> no, i think that those teenagers -- some of those teenagers ended up staying on tiktok but also setting up shop elsewhere at the same time and because of that, are now maybe using some of the instagram and facebook services this ways that they might not have otherwise. >> i'd like to bomb ypoll you gn this we were talking about fastly and

we had twilly on yesterday and an ipo recently of a cloud company. i'll having trouble picking my favorite cloud company >> don't forget ibm. >> and do you have a favorite? can you distinguish between the cloud companies and do you have a favorite that is the best cloud company, andrew? which one do you think really -- >> i don't >> there are so many it is easier to pick a noncloud company. >> by the end of it, we'll be a cloud company. we'll be a nonlinear tv network living on -- peacock to some degree is a cloud company. >> okay. that is my favorite then you came up with it right there. you just hit it. you did that for me, andrew, fantastic. coming up, some new lockdowns in major european cities helping

drive overseas markets lower we'll be monitoring it and u.s. quequity futures are down still up near 30,000, so like 1%

welcome back wells fargo firing more than 100 employees for allegedly defrauding a fell pandemic relief program multiple reports now saying the bank determined that former staffers knowingly defrauded the small business administration by falsely applying for covid-19 relieffunds for themselves and this is a story that doesn't help the reputation of wells fargo, which has been a reputati reputational mess sadly. >> and i think this is different. in the past it was bad employee behavior, but it was in-send iz radioed and i ed and ignored by management but now i give kudos to the bank

for finding those employees and getting rid of them. this is different from the did you have that they have gotten dinged for in the past >> when i read it, i was like who was doing the hiring at wells far go for a number of years? like holy god. whatthe hiring at well far go for a number of years like holy god. what was the f-- you could have skit about that almost a candidate comes in, what are you looking for? you will pretty sneaky, you're hired. >> joe, i'm with you 100 of these people, it is one thing to give them credit for -- >> how many were doing the accounts i think i still have a couple -- no, i'm kitdding, i don't, but you know, having been a stockbroker, if you could open accounts, it was so hard because you had to make so many calls. if you can just open them in the phone book, hey, this guy looks good, he has an account.

>> huge problem no question. and they ignored it for years. their system was set up to incentivize some of those things >> corporate culture might have been an issue. >> lax for sure. yeah >> worth pointing out by the way, and this may make becky's point to some degree, jpmorgan had not a problem in terms of this level, but there were people at jpmorgan that they ended up firing that were involved in fraud as well. but i think the level and extent of the number of people involved from the outside from what it appears on wells fargo seems so extreme, you have to think that there is some kind of cultural problem at play here >> those are fair points and does bring up questions. let's talk about another story about school undergraduate enrollment fell by 4%, dragged down by a 16% drop in first year

students the biggest drop came in freshman enrollment in community colleges down by nearly 23%. the national student clearing house research center which compiled this data said strained family finances was probably the biggest factor enrollment in graduate programs actually increased by nearly 3%, probably people thought maybe staying in school was a better idea than getting out there and trying to find a job >> i don't know, college was so great. remember last time really nothing is expecteded of you except studying, grades. and it is a great four years obviously. and i feel bad for people that are -- i used to think that it would be a semester. now it looks like a year and i hope that is it. and even high school, you know, senior year, i feel bad for my son,s it is like he's at home,i

is sad, you are missing out on some of that -- we didn't appreciate it as much back then and how great it really was. now things are expected of us. >> unfortunately, we never do in the moment that is the saddest part, right? >> yeah, youth is wasted on the young, andrew, right anyway, this is interesting too. alabama head football coach nick saban in tand the school's athletic director now tested positive for covid-19. saban who is 68 said he didn't have any symptoms but he immediately isolated at home alabama is scheduled to host georgia on saturday. that is always a really big deal both teams are coming ve doing s year, so a big match-up. wish them both well. meantime, saturday's game between florida and lsu has been

postponed after the gators had a surge of 21 positive tests this week they are scheduled to the built-in bye week that the ncaa now has, so the week of december 12th >> and a lot more coming up this morning including we'll talk about robert smith who reportedly settled a tax probe with the just tis department, about 1$140 million we'll talk about what landed him in hot water and in the next hour, we'll dig into the story that says that private warnings by white house advisers including larry kudlow helped hedge funds get ahead of the pandemic selloff in february and march. stay restless with the icon that does the same, the rx crafted by lexus. lease the 2020 rx350 for $409 a month for 36 months. experience amazing at your lexus dealer.

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welcome back to "squawk box. sources tell us that the wealthiest african-american cou, reached a $140 million settle himself with the justice department over a tax probe. robert frank has more. >> good morning. robert smith reportedly reaching a settlement with the justice department and the irs after a four year criminal tax probe this agreement would call for smith to pay $140 million in back taxes, fines and penalties. that would be among the largest settlements ever by an american taxpayer to settle an offshore tax investigation. smith is expected to enter into a nonprosecution agreement admitting to liability for taxes owed and for not filing foreign

bank account reports now, all of this stems from an offshore entity that was created with a $1 billion investment from houston billionaire robert brockman that was made as a seed investment in vista equity partners in 2000 you now, at issue was whether smith paid taxes on $200 million in profits that he directed to this offshore entity and whether he failed to properly disclose that entity to tax officials smith who is worth more than $5 billion is reportedly cooperating with tax investigators which could lead to further announcements and charges at a press conference in san francisco later today. and we should add that i reached out to both robert smith and vista and neither is commenting for now. back to you. >> robert, appreciate the report i was going to say, you know, i've been trying to dig into report this out just like you. and my understanding, this took place when he was in his 30s and

because of the way the offshore tax structure, he was paying with the carry if you will that was drenktsdirected to him but t paying effectively the money sent to this offshore tax structure. the offshore tax strublgcture le on used that money as part of a charitable philanthropic payment which i think was efforted or not only the way to pay philanthropy, but also to escape the tax payment. my understanding is that as part of this settlement, he will accept and admit, i don't know if it is wrongdoing per se, but to acknowledge that the mistake was made the question i was going to ask is whether you think this has any inch pli indication k impli philanthropy or his business given that vista itself seems to be unrelated to it, though obviously connected given the original funds >> we'll see

obviously they had a call with investors yesterday where they tried to quell some of those concerns over whether vista was a target, which they are not he owed taxes on $30 million he will admit that he did owe that $30 million on the $200 million in assets and income but he is worth $5 billion so i think that this could largely put this behind him. but remember, this offshore entities was created and directeded eby bob brockman wh gave the seed money to really help launch vista equity back in 2000 and according to these report, brockman said look, i want you to pay a portion of your income that carry into this offshore entities and brockman would have control of that if he ever wanted to. and you're right most of smith's income was taxed and reported, but it was this portion that brockman directed intothese ois

offshore entities so brockman could control it and that appears to how it all started. and you're right that the money eventually flowed into his charitable fund which went to morehouse, carnegie, all the things that he's funded since then >> and was it the $34 million he was going to spend to pay off all the morehouse students debt last year, was that part of this whole thing? >> robert may know i'm not sure money is fungible, so you could argue that money has gone from one fund to another. clearly some of the funds was used for philanthropy, i don't know if it was the more "house" dou "house"house or not. do you know? >> this offshore entities was created in 2000. the money was transferred into what is now his charitable giving fund in 2014. so that was six years ago. morehouse was last year.

so this not offshore fund or the onshore fund has been in existence since 2014 $30 million is the taxes he owed $110 million is the penalty, fines and interest >> okay. robert frank, thank you to explaining all of to us. big lineup still to come, at 7:00 a.m., we have walmart ceo doug mcmillan and then new jersey governor phil murphy. and 8:00 hour, we'll bring you the president of shopify and a news making interview with steven mnuchin and also the ceo of united airlines a lot still to go this morning

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rudow jones how down 270, s down 36, nasdaq having big up days, but giving back almost 200 today. a lot of it has to do with covid worries. european countries are trying to stop a second wave and londoners are being told that they will not be loied to mix with other households inside and public transportation should be avoided and the government of france declared a state of emergency giving it powers to put in a curfew from 9:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. it will be in pra place for four weeks. the number of people hospitalized with covid passed a threshold of 9100, first time since june and european stocks are showing similar losses to

what we're seeing. actually worse than what we're seeing so far in the united states andrew >> meantime facebook and twitter decided to limit the reach of a new york "post" story about alleged smoking gun emails showing hunter biden introduced his father to ukranian businessman. the biden campaign has denied this story and nbc has not matched the "post" reporting or seen the emails in question. and in a new twist last night, twitter ceo jack dorsey tweeting that the communications ash its actions were not great and blocking the ability to share the link without context was unacceptable it is a drama. joining us right now, joanne litman from the newt of advanced study. and also ben smith, with the "new york times. good morning to you both a lot to debate here and try to understand the powers of social media during this period joanne, i'll start with you.

are you in agreement with what twitter and facebook are doing or do you think that journalistic organizations -- >> i think that we have to go back -- >> -- should publish this stuff? >> yeah, look, the original sin here for facebook, for twitter, for all the social platforms is that they didn't want to have any rules around speech. which they don't want to be considered a publisher and be liable for that content. the unfortunate situation, that then led to this cesspool of conspiracy theories and mal information. and now they will belatedly trying to put the rules in and there is no on consistency this is an incredibly ham handed way to handle that new york "post" piece because by doing so, what they ended up doing is calling much more attention to that story

than it otherwise would have gotten so you have a situation where -- >> but this goes very much to the issue of who do you want to either be the arbiter of the news and of the quote/unquote truth. ben, what do you think >> who do i let be the arbiter of the news? you of course. but i think, you know, as joanne said, they just totally reacted. twitter executives essentially watch journalists and activists yell at them and decide they ought to do something in realtime when you just watch it play out and you almost feel the impulse from the twitter team that is like gosh, we own twitter, all this stuff playing out, we have to act. and as joanne said, it totally black fired. and i do think what facebook did, you so either beginning of

what sort of looks like a system they didn't ham handedly ban it, they have a system under way in which they essentially caused things to like reduce their spread while their independent fact checks check out whether something is factual i don't know, there are a lot of problems when you have largely underpaid junior journalists at these fact checking organizations as the ultimate arbiters that is its own huge problem but i think the notion that the real problem is the speed with which things can go viral and there are cases where like just damp it down a bit does make sense because often the context isn't available. >> joanne, how would you set it up and the reason i ask, you have a situation where historically news organizations that were considered credible and by the way the new york "post" was considered as part of that because they have an editorial operation and they have editors

and the like, obviously you can argue that they make mistakes, maybe they make them on purpose, by the way all organizations including mine own make mistakes so should the stories be distributed and should be the arbiter of it? >> yeah, this was a very unusual situation because the new york "post" as you say, it is a mainstream news organize and i love the "post." it is a tabloid, they stretch things and play with things, but they usually don't do what they did yesterday which this particular piece was beyond the pail fle for the new york "post" because it wasn't verified but the fact is that we have never seen mainstream media publications being fact checked and shut down or, you know, reduced in terms of sharing by a facebook or twitter. but we also had never seen them having to do that for a president of the united states this is -- the issue here is we have to get to a point i do

think where the platforms have -- do bear legal responsibility, some legal responsibility for the content that they are -- that they are promulgating there they have tried for years and years to say we're not a publisher, we're essentially just like the telecom wires, we have no control and no responsibility for what appears on our platforms now, they have belatedly trying to figure out how to do that, but a big part of the issue is simply that they don't have consistent rules they do have some rules, they are constantly changing the rules. they only -- facebook only recently said okay, we will ban holocaust denial posts which is something that they were allowing for some reason so they changed the rules, but you then they don't consistently enforce them and that is the first step that we've got to see going on there.

>> ben, is it too much to ask that maybe if the new york "post" is a tabloid and likes to play things up, is it too much to ask for a reputable news organization just to check into this, don't they have some type of duty just to -- if it is absolutely false, they should confirm that it is absolutely false. isn't that something that they need to do instead of just not letting it get out >> i think with this one actually, the system was working. like you had other journalists basically saying that this is shady, we'll try to report around it and see what is going on it also is not totally clear that it was false from top to bottom biden denied that meeting that was alleged took place, which i think that the broader could not text is it was in the context of a bunch of monday sense thnonset matter very much anyway. and this was a story that was totally incomprehensible to

people that are not participants in this marvel character universe of this largely fake ukraine scandal. so i don't think that this was something that would overthrow american democracy i think it was a garbage story largely in the way that it came out and how little the post really even knew about what it had. but the journalists without the help of twitter really would be able to figure out >> but if the "new york times" or "washington post" goes and finds that there was -- what do you call if? it would be called play for pay if confirmed if you made $83,000 a month because you set up a meeting between, you know, my guy, which this crazy emails say, that would be something usually that woodward and bernstein would be all over it. >> the "new york times" and other outlets have reported with

many thousands of words on joe biden and ukraine. and the core allegation obviously is that biden allegedly pushed prosecutors to intervene on the behalf of a company that his son operated. and the truth as far as i can figure out, that is just not true and these settles are sort of happening in that context. >> so it is okay though -- if that didn't happen, is it okay to broker a meeting -- >> is it okay for politicians and kids do stuff? no, it is gross. i think the issue with this story is like the strange neneso the emails and how unclear it was when the "post" published what was real and what wasn't. and the broader context that i think hasn't born out. but those are journalistic problems that it is fine to argue about, you don't need twitter coming in and deleting

things >> joanne, ben, thank you. it is a longer debate and conversation but i imagine that it is one that is not going away appreciate you waking up early coming up, a new report out of europe says that governments are calling for a crackdown on big tech details next plus don't miss our exclusive interview with walmart ceo doug mccmillon in the next hour and, in more and more cities, the unprecedented performance of ultra wideband. the fastest 5g in the world. it will change your phone and how businesses do everything. i'm proud, because we didn't build it the easy way, we built it right. this is the 5g america's been waiting for. only from verizon.

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welcome back want to draw your attention to a story out of europe that is putting pressure on the big tech stocks the financial "times" is reporting that france and netherlands are calling on eu competition authorities to take measure against the big technology giants as additional legislation is being prepared. the ft cites a position paper that says breaking inthe big companies is now, quote, on the table. and that is an issue none of these companies are named, but you can guess who they might be targeting. apple, facebook, amazon and alphabet shares all down around 2% apple down by 2.4%, amazon down by 2.2% and facebook by 1.6% but there has been talk around this we focus so much on the u.s. potentially regulating some of these things we'll have to see what happens with europe. something bill gates told us

yesterday he thought you should be watching too. we'll talk more about the big tech companies after this break. and the next guest has three stock picks for you saying despite the run-up, if you pick the right es, onthere is still room to run. we'll be right back.

welcome back our next guest says that even with massive year-to-date gains and information technology, there's room for growth as long as you pick the right stocks joining us with her picks is joan joanne feeny,and you say you still like big names like apple or microsoft, but it when it

comes to the stocks you like the most, you're focusing on semiconductors why is that? >> yeah, that's right, becky you know, the one thing we really recognize about this market is the i.t. sector in the market as a whole has been driven higher by a handful of stocks our clients are expressing that same fear as i.t. comes too fast too far, the key thing is to look specifically at the stocks that still offer value and that still have room to run. that can be in semiconductor, we like a few of those a fair bit but also cyber security, digital payments, but a handful of them in the semiconductor space, broad com, qualcomm, nxp, right in the online tail winds we're seeing because of covid. they have diversified into software and right in the middle of the iphone 12 super cycle and

in addition, they offer good income for clients, and some of our clinents are thinking about income given how much the stock market has gone up >> good income just in terms of the dividend >> yeah, broadcom is offering 3.4% dividend. they have done this in sequential decembers we are expecting a 10 to 15% increase in the dividend when we customize portfolios for clients, we give them a lot of insurance by mixing together the potential for appreciation and income so you have to be in information technology, but you don't have to own the index you can own the ones that are offering a good value, 3 1/2% dividend, likely to continue to raise the dividend year after year, plus they have the strong tail winds of online, cloud, cyber security, software plays so that's a good one, and then you look at a company like nxpi, go someplace else, look at a different tail wind.

they're heavily exposed to autos. not only is the auto sector rebounding, manufacturing rising but the electronic content in cars is going up significantly, and then when we move to electric cars, that's more content for a company like nxpi. they offer a small dividend but nevertheless, they're offering good growth opportunities as that electronic content in cars goes up. so you know, clients from our perspective, they're looking for that mixture, and you need to be in i.t. to get it, but you can also find income there >> joanne, thank you for the conversation today and the ideas, it's good to see you. >> you bet, becky. good to be here. >> andrew? >> thanks, becky coming up, we have a huge lineup of guests coming your way, including walmart's ceo, doug mcmillan is joining us new jersey governor phil murphy, treasury secretary, steven mnuchin, and united airlines ceo, scott kirby and a whole lot

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wall street struggling to rebound, not doing a very good job of it this morning after a two-day slide that we have seen with the markets the election and coronavirus aide from washington keeping investors on their toes. we've got a look at what you need to watch at the opening bell that's straight ahead. plus, walmart ceo doug mcmillan joins us to talk about the business round table's new initiatives to advance racial equality in the united states. and we'll be hearing from new jersey governor phil murphy on the battle against the coronavirus. also, much more, second hour of "squawk box" begins right now. good morning, welcome back to "squawk box" here on cnbc

i'm andrew ross sorkin along with becky quick and joe kernen. we are in the red this morning in large part on the back of some red in europe as concerns continue about potential lock downs there. the dow looking like it would open down about 252 points right now. s&p 500 looking to open off about 34 points and the nasdaq looking to open down about 168 points we're going to keep our eyes on the futures for the next two hours, two and a half hours before this open to see where things continue to head one way or the other becky. >> thanks, andrew. this morning the business round table which is made up of over 200 of america's largest employers is going to be announcing a new corporate initiative to try and help create more equitable access to economic opportunities for black americans and other communities of color for more on this, let's bring in our guest this morning, joining us now is doug mcmillan. he is the president and ceo of walmart. he's also the chairman of the business round table overseeing

this initiative, and doug, it's good to see you. thanks for being with us this morning. >> thank you. >> we spoke with you about all of this, this initiative, what the brt was looking into over the summer, and you have found, made some progress, and you're here to tell us about it where do things stand right now, what have you all learned after looking into this a little more deeply >> sure. we kicked things off in june, and as you may remember, we asked ceos, members o.to take on complex systems in the country and try to understand why all too often inkequities are being generated, housing, health care, education, the equitable justice committee, craig arnold, randall steven chuck robyns has been great,

another with other ceos that, worked together and went through over the last few months looking at policies and what companies do, how government works, and today we're generating a report sharing our findings and it does focus on what we the businesses can do in particular large businesses but hopefully there's some ideas in there for smaller businesses as well, but also policy recommendations in each one of these areas to try and create an outcome where we have a more equitable system i would say we have learned a lot, talked to over a hundred different experts and we don't see this as the end, becky, we see this as an update on what we have learned and recommendations we are making to the country and for ourselves. there is obviously a lot more work to do with everything going on from the pandemic to all of us trying to make sure the economy gets to where it needs to get to, the election, we want to keep a spotlight on racial equity and keep the work moving forward. >> what are one to two of the recommendations you came away

with from big employers, things you and other companies can do. >> you've got to start at home and the work we're doing there's a lot of agreement that we should increase transparency, share more data. companies are putting out more metrics more often, which helps with accountability. everyone is looking at our hiring practices, promotional practices, pay equity, making commitments as it comes to that. looking at the board structure in composition, executive management, the associate based overall, trying to make sure that all of our systems that exist within these companies, look in our case, in walmart, a company that looks like america because that's what we serve so if you look at our board or executive management, that's what we want to see in time. >> and in terms of the public policy initiatives obviously when a group like the business round table gets behind it and says this is something we want, if you flex your muscle and really push that, with legislators, it could make some progress

what are maybe one or two of the biggest public policy initiatives that you all will be pushing for as a result of this? >> we hope so. one easy one is the digital twitwi divide we have to get rural broad band to the rural areas during the course of the year we have seen what's happened. our sales of laptops at walmart, and all of the challenges that people have had as it relates to education. there are other things that we can do to change some of the federal housing rules. really it comes down to communities, becky, and if you looked at this from a system view, all of these systems, the education system, the finance system, they end up landing in a community. if you think of a place, what are the ingredients that are there that change the outcome so that when someone is born, the zip code they're born in does not dictate their future that's how these things need to come together and work there are a lot of policy recommendations and people can

find it on the business round table web site we hope that you'll go read it >> doug, i want to ask you about how americans are doing overall right now, and at walmart, you probably have a better idea than just about anybody in terms of the consumer walmart sales make up 10% of overall u.s. retail sales. what are you seeing right now from the consumer and what does that tell you about their health >> yeah, as it relates to the kind of challenging side, i think what we see is the separation and the stimulus conversation comes to mind we need to make sure we're getting support to families that need it. some are struggling more than others we have to identify them and get them the help they need. we have to make sure the small businesses can come back online to a greater degree to what it's currently looking like, and take care of bigger industries like the airline industries consumers are finding ways to have some joy. you know, we've got halloween coming up and people are buying halloween costumes i think there's going to be a

celebration of christmas and the other holidays that will be strong, as people are at home. i think that feeling of safety and togetherness people are still searching for ways to have as much normalcy as they can >> doing that in terms of spending on some of those things that aren't absolute necessities, how do you kind of break down just what the health of the consumer is right now are people feeling flush, still, like they were a few months ago when we spoke to you >> not everyone is in the same camp there are still people being at home more, spending medicine or their home, and doing things to redecorate, and those kinds of things but there are other people that are struggling paycheck to paycheck if they have a paycheck, and so many people are unemployed, we're seeing that pressure as well it's really a spectrum, you know, it always is but this moment in time has more separation in it, in terms of how people are feeling and behaving than we would normally see. >> andrew?

>> hey, doug, i wanted to ask you a little bit about the supply chain last time we talked to you, we talked about how it's very hard to buy a bicycle still or, you know, gym equipment. what kind of stuff is now back in stock that wasn't, and what kind of stuff isn't still? >> andrew, the things are longer lead times have been a bit more challenging, and then from time to time, you'll see a community that's got an increase in cases and you see more stock up behavior again in general, things are getting better week to week, we're shipping more than we're selling lately that was not always the case, and we're seeing things improve. if i could change one thing about our business it's a higher in-stock level we've still got recovery to do >> and then the other thing i just wanted to add, doug, the only other thing i wanted to ask you was, you know, clearly you're capturing business or at

least some business that had been going to amazon, and you know, amazon obviously one of your biggest competitors, i imagine, but there are things that they couldn't ship, and i think people started to look to you, and to look to target in ways that they didn't before the question is do you think that those are new customers that are sustainable customers or do you think that a post pandemic world or a world where the supply chain is complete again, that things revert. and how do you keep them >> yeah, throughout this year and even before, we were seeing store traffic, kind of our core customer business be strong, and we were starting to attract a lot of new customers because of new services we offer. customers want to save time. they love the pickup business, they're taking advantage in an a increasing way of delivery centers, in addition to ecommerce fulfillment centers. we have a nice mix of customers

that have come our way and some before, and we hope of course to retain them. the experience that they have, the value they find. that will dictate it the walmart plus membership is also one tactic that we have to try to build some loyalty and solidify that relationship and make it easier for you to shop it's no mystery what people want, what customers and families want. they want an incredibly broad assortment of high quality merchandise at a terrific value, and they want the experience to be as frictionless, simple and easy as it can be, and whether it's us or our competition, if we keep them top of mind and do everything we can to make those things happen better than anybody else, we'll be able to keep the new customers and that's what we're focused on. >> you guys have to continue to do things differently because of covid, and i know that black friday is going to look quite a bit different this year than years past, there are not going to be the door busters of lines of people trying to get in

how are you managing it this year >> we're spreading it out, we want to keep people safe, that's our priority this year our associates safe, our customers safe one way to do that is move more of the items to online only but we will have some in stores as well, and hopefully we do a good job of kpcommunicating to customers what's what. we have broken it through three events staged throughout the month of november, beginning, middle and end of the month. there will be a feeling for those that want to come into our stores, have a black friday experience, it will be with fewer items and we'll manage from a safety point of view things differently given covid as we have been all year ppe, facial coverings, social distancing, we use our parking lots more for pickup you know what i think customers are going to like, i think they're going to find great values at walmart. i think they're going to find it more convenient, and for some of them and for us, that one big spike wasn't the best way to run the business we had to do it because that's what customers want to

experience it's a tradition to go out on that weekend, and we'll still have some of that, but the idea of smoothing this out may be something that sticks and lasts post pandemic, because people find that they enjoy it even more >> hey, doug, i want to go back to andrew's question about the supply chain if there's one thing you would change, you would have much more supply at this point where are the problems where are the real crunch spots and why is it so tough to get things still >> it's really widespread. it's not just one category demand is just high for things that people are needing at home. we still have stocks in things related to the home categories consumables have gotten better, the paper categories has improved, hand sanitizers have improved, facial coverings good recovery in grocery not really worrying about what's happening in fresh grocery we have been strong in fruit and veg all the way through. protein categories are in good shape. it's sporadic across the store,

you may find we're not as instock on crafts and fabrics. toys we're out of stock on those are the things that disappoint us. we're working on them. if you walk through a store, you would feel better than you would have a month or two ago, but we would be able to point to an item here or there that's not fully back in stock. >> at the business round table, you all surveyed, i think, 150 of the ceos in the biggest companies in america to see how they're feeling right now in terms of confidence, i think they're feeling a little more confident than they had been but you're talking about incredibly low level, about the lowest levels in a decade, is that accurate >> there's still a lot of uncertainty. i think that's how people are feeling and that's what showed up it's hard to call, you know, a number of companies including ours have withdrawn our forecast looking forward because of that lack of certainty. so we're all kind of managing this situation week to week, month to month, and not quite as

long term in some ways as we would normally be. i think as visibility starts to improve, hopefully with progress on the convenience avaccines anr things, we can have more confidence i do think some level of stimulus now and maybe even in the future that's really targeted, sensible, practical, may be needed to address what i described earlier which is this separation in our economy. >> you have encouraged the congressional leaders and the administration to come back to the table. it does seem like treasury secretary mnuchin has been making some broader offers on that, but it does not look like they are any closer to a deal. treasury secretary mnuchin says he and nancy pelosi are still very far apart when it comes to this we have him joining us later this morning what message would you give to him, and what message would you give to nancy pelosi >> i think for both sides, they need to keep in mind there are americans that need them

that don't really care about what's happening in politics, aren't completely tied up in this election, and they just need some help these small businesses need help, and so if they could get something done that would help those groups, that would be fantastic and much needed and if something needs to be done in the future, we can come back and talk about that. but doing nothing is not the first and best option. >> the ceos that you surveyed also think that the longer this goes on, the more permanent damage there is to the united states do you have any way of measuring that of kind of showing that how do you all come to that conclusion, and how would you present that information to those in washington who are making these decisions right now? >> i think small and medium business in particular is why we're feeling that way there are companies that have resources, companies that have have been able to weather the storm better than others, but those that have suffered, the mom and pop restaurants of the country that we're really

worried about, and they drive is much of the economy. we need them we need them as customers, we all need them just from a societal point of view that's part of what we love about living in this country is how vital small business is, and so that's where that comes from. >> nancy pelosi has said that she would like to wait and see more, and we have had senators that have accused her of not wanting to do anything before the election i think treasury secretary mnuchin has implied the same thing, said the same thing, would you want them to wait for the perfect or want them to just get this out and get something done >> it's better to get something done and come back and make adjustments. you know, we're going to be trying to solve these problems beyond just these next few months and next year, so making steps, collaborating, working together, reaching some middle ground on some of these issues and then evaluating watching the data that makes more sense, you know, if i were running, think of this

like running a business, that's the way we would approach it you make decisions that are clearly the best decisions they may not be completely to where you need to get to, but you come back later, recalibrate, make another decision i think that's the way that i would recommend that they approach it. >> there has been so much drama surrounding the tiktok deal with you and oracle, walmart expected to get a 7 1/2% stake of this, you going on the board, but there has been so much drama and so many politics inserted around that, where do things stand and do you even know at this point >> it has received a lot of coverage i think maybe what i should start with is why would we be interested the digital front end of retail of commerce is changing. and you know, we participate with a digital front end with our own app, but we also exist on facebook and instagram, and google search and all of these

things are ways to reach customers and be part of someone's life, and sell things, which is what we do as a business, and social commerce which has taken off even more in china is a really interesting new dimension of retail. it's a discovery opportunity if you're watching a tiktok video and somebody's got a piece of apparel or item on it that you really like. what if you could just quickly purchase that item that's what we're seeing happening in countries around the world. it's intriguing to us, and we would like to be part of it. our focuses and conversations with bite dance are around that, ecommerce, fulfillment services. if you click on the garment you want to buy, and it takes two weeks to get there, that's not a good experience. how could we help with a supply chain, a back end that makes the whole experience, not just the moment you buy the item and how all of it goes fu fulfillment, payment, maybe as a service, along with just selling things to our first party and

third party marketplace is the idea that's the partnership we want to reach obviously all national security concerns from governments have to be addressed. we're not in those conversations so like you, we're watching to see what happens there but should there be a path where that can be taken care of and people are satisfied, we think we can delight customers with front end, back end experience, partnering with bite dance those conversations continue don't have any update beyond that. >> doug, thank you for your time today. it's really great to see you, and we appreciate it. >> thank you, all. >> by the way, we should mention that doug is being honored tonight at the executive leadership council's virtual gala he'll be receiving their 2020 corporate leadership award there tonight. joe? >> thanks, becky. coming up, quarterly results from morgan stanley. as we go to break, let's check out the shares of walgreens, th company reporting $1.02 a arshe.

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billionaire ceo cocreated an app called synapse media player? the answer, mark zuckerberg. both microsoft and aol approached zuckerberg to buy the app. but he turned them down and posted that technology online for free >> welcome back to "squawk box" this morning apple unveiling the iphone 12 this week. the company's first 5g iphone and declared that the era of 5g has begun. does that mean it's time for all of us to rush out and get a 5g iphone that's the question of the morning, and jon fortt joins us with answers on the other hand >> it's october, which means it's pastime for apple to tell us we need to spend a new thousand dollars on a new iphone, and the excuse this year is 5g. this one has 5g, faster internet my 4 glte signal keeps dropping in my neighborhood, eight years

after the first 4g iphone came out. can we fix that. i bought a new phone this year, iphone se because i specifically knew i do not need a 5g iphone, and i'm a tech guy we're in a pandemic. life is short, money's tight 5g is going to take years to get to a good level of coverage, and high level speeds. you don't need to be online tomorrow preordering a 5g iphone you're better off buying a 5g phone when the hype buys down and the practicality dials up. >> okay. that's one take. i get it if a lot of people think like you, apple is going to have a hard time, though, selling the iphone 12 tomorrow is that what's going to happen >> well, on the other hand, did you see apple's presentation on tuesday? i mean, i have been bagging on 5g a bit, networks aren't ready, and verizon ceo got on stage with tim cook, and said the era

of 5g is here. people keep their phones for three or four years now. we don't upgrade every year, if you need a new phone now, you might as well buy the 5g, in two years, you'll be wishing your friends have 5g. the question is shouldn't you buy a phone you don't need of course not, but if you're going to buy a phone, it would be irresponsible at a moment like this not to buy one with 5g and a great camera, i guess. >> so hold on, jon, you know, i like this game because i get to hear both sides. but there's part of me that actually wants to hear what you actually are going to do so what is the fortt family doing on the phone front >> i really did buy an iphone se earlier this year because i don't need a 5g iphone and my coverage is bad around my house. there are people that aren't in my exact situation, who only buy one every three or four years, and a 5g iphone probably makes

sense for them especially if cameras are important, et cetera, you might as well future proof your purchase so you're not in a position where you're spending all over again. >> are you future proofing yourself because it seems to me that, yes, these are 5g phones but whatever comes next year and the year after that, especially as the networks get better and they figure out how to manage battery power better, one of the things they're going to be doing is throttling you from using 5g at certain points to 4 g to save battery life don't you think in a year or two they're going to figure out a lot more. >> always, andrew. but when we're buying a car we don't do this. i need a car now but i'm going to wait until next year, you know, when there's better digital dash board in the package. you buy a car now. maybe you try to live with it or

upgrade it or add whatever apps you can later. that's the mode we have to get into practically, do you need a phone now, if so, consider the best option for you, what is available right now. i mean, if you're just shopping for fun, that's a whole different issue. >> okay. and then final, prediction for the investor class out there is this going to be a super cycle or not >> i think there's a good chance it will be, andrew i think the question is in the major markets where 5g is supposed to be active, where verizon and at&t in particular, and t-mobile is that dark horse, i have been saying we've got good 5g, when the reviewers go out there and do their speed test, is it going to be better than 4 g and in enough places where people are that's the case people are going to make for, well, hey, i want faster speeds and if in my particular area it's good, i'll go ahead and buy it. >> okay. jon fortt, thanks. we've got breaking news we have to get to

we have to get to wolf on morgan stanley results. >> just crossing as we speak, and revenue a nice beat, 11.7 billion the forecast was for 10.7 eps, come in at 166 the forecast was 128 a pretty clear beat on both lines, perhaps not quite to the scale on the headline numbers as the goldman sachs beat, and that's largely because the asset management was such a big beat let's go through the individual lines. investment banks, 1.7 billion, in line with expectations, trading a little better than expected 1.9 in fixed income. 2.3 billion in equities, both a little ahead of expectations and i think puts in equities, which is important to them slightly ahead of goldman sachs. goldman sachs was 2.1, they have 2.3 billion. global wealth management which is a core driver for morgan

stanley now, 4.6 billion the forecast is 4.5. fantastic print either way goldman's print on asset management was a big beat. morgan stanley has a different business model thachlt don an area they talked about with goldman, valued up perhaps we could have expected that difference in terms of scale of beat, nonetheless a strong number in investment management, 1.1 billion. the forecast for 855 looks like compensation expense, fraction above expectation, and noncompensation expense, largely in line of what was expected the shares up fractionally in the pre-market other banks are down in the pre-market it's a relative slight outperformance and week to date, morgan stanley up. holding on to their out performance for the week so far. >> thanks very much. we'll see you soon. when we come back, an article in today's "new york

times" shining a light on the early days of the pandemic the white house response and the market selloff we have the details straight ahead. plus, new jersey governor phil murphy on rising covid cases in his state, and much more. and later, at&t communications ceo on the rollout of apple's iphone and the company's network. plus, treasury secretary steven mnuchin will join us for the latest on stimulus talks "squawk box" will be right back.

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let's get you caught up with this morning's top stock stories. well, well, frank holland joins us now @frankcnbc you know why i like that, frank, because you don't need to put your last name in there. you're frank and that's all anyone needs to know, and same with mine. joe squawk, and you know what else, when people get mad, they put @frankholland and you don't get the nasty stuff. people don't know my twitter and i like it that way. >> i don't think people are as mad as me at they are generally you, so i don't have the same issue. dow component, walgreens up more than 2% after reporting adjusted

quarterly profit, beating estimates by $0.06 and a 2.2% increase to its quarterly dividend fastly plunging more than 28%. the company lowered its third quarter guidance, saying usage of the fastly platform did not meet expectations because of geopolitical uncertainty the customer previously disclosed to be tiktok, accounting for 12% of revenue. turning to alcoa, the company was helped by stronger prices for key products and improving demand from the auto sector, warning the aluminum business could face challenges this quarter. let's get over to phil lebeau which has more on united earnings which reported after the bell yesterday. >> shares of united under a little bit of pressure this morning after reporting earnings after the bell yesterday those earnings coming in with a wider atlan wider than expected loss of 8.06

a share. $1.8 billion of revenue falling, 78%, but the key metric everybody is focused on, what happened with cash burn. for a point of reference, they were burning as much as $50 million a day in march that came down to 40 million in the second quarter 25 million last quarter. $21 million a day when you strip out severance and debt payments. the earnings report also getting some attention because there was no guidance given in terms of break even in other words, when did they get down to zero cash burn on a daily basis. however, you can bet that will likely be a question that comes up later on during the united conference call with analysts, and speaking of something to watch a little bit later on this morning. do not miss our exclusive coming up at 8:40 we'll be talking with united ceo, scott kirby we'll talk about the numbers, getting to break even, a lot of things on the tap to talk about with scott kirby joe, back to you. >> phil, looking forward to that

coming up in the 8:30 hour great. wall street trying to avoid a trifecta, a 3-day slide. that's what's going to happen if we stay where we are right now, mike santoli, i don't know what the prospects are. someone needs to use the s word, we've got mnuchin on, maybe we'll hear the s word, maybe that will help >> santoli or stimulus >> i do think right now the market has set that aside in terms of the abosolute imminent, maybe that's one of the things weighing on the market we were up four days in a row. it's pay back mode right now the s&p 500 etf right here showing you a little less than a 1% decline at the moment on monday, i was pointing out that we had a very similar dynamic to what we saw in june, when you came sharply off a multi-month high and broke out of it. you do see it kind of chopped

around we broke out of this i'm not predicting it. what we're seeing is not incompatible with the market trying to turn a consolidate, and have some of the real overheated winning groups cool off a little bit yesterday they did it was growth in tech pulling back and some of the value names had one of their days in the sun. take a look at one of the cloud etfs this is one of the leadership groups within tech, and what you see is almost exactly, you know, matching the high from back in late august, early september fastly, obviously the victim of the day was about a 2 to 3% wading in this particular etf. i do wonder if the fastly news is causing people to rethink their exposure to a lot of momentum growth tech in the same area and even if they don't have the same fundamentals a lot of the same people own the same stocks one down 25% maybe it's time to step back i think that's one of the drivers today, becky. >> i know we're looking more at technical things and some of the reasons behind it. there's always this drive to try

and say, oh, here's the one reason the market is down today. i can give you three at this point. one would be the stimulus talks that joe just mentioned. one would be the resurgence in cases in the eu and some of the european lock downs they are potentially facing this weekend, and the third is the financial times story talking about a couple of european countries on board with european regulatory efforts to try and do things to big tech companies, potentially break them up. would you point at any of those three as a reason for today's down move? >> i would say, i don't believe that the lack of stimulus is something fresh enough at this point that it's going to be the mover and, by the way, that's not going to impact mostly the big growth stocks. the other two items, absolutely, if there's going to be an aggressive regulatory push, one more reason to lighten up on the crowd. the resurgence reinforces we're in hunker down mode. might not get help on fiscal

we might see more restrictions popping up and again, just good excuses to step back on risk after we had a good run over the course of three weeks up something like 8% i think it's about when the market is ready to focus on the potential negatives or risks because of where the market got to, and i think that's where we are this week. >> great mike, thank you. good to see you. >> when we come up, new jersey governor phil murphy is going to join us for the lastn e ats battle against covid much more, too "squawk box" will be right back.

welcome back to "squawk box," a story in the "new york times" this morning getting a lot of attention it is titled quote as the virus spread, reports of trump administration private briefings fueled selloff the piece looks at a february 24th tweet from president trump that said the coronavirus threat was very much under control and stock market starting to look very good to me. earlier that same day, members of the president's economic team were privately addressing board

members of the hoover institution sounded a lot less confident and the next day, documents obtained by the times learned larry kudlow learned the virus was contained in the u.s. to date, but now we just don't know that was different than the rosier message that he had shared on cnbc earlier that day. now, the times article is based on a document written by a hedge fund consultant that attended the three-day gathering. the point was wealthy republican donors were getting an early warning on a dangerous situation at a time when the president was being publicly optimistic that there was no covid threat. the times says the consultant's memo spread among investors showing how elite traders got access to information, and then as a result had a financial advantage. the article says that david tepper was among some of the traders that received the consultant's memo but responding to the "new york times" piece, t tepper told us that we were concerned about the virus in

january, and went on cnbc on february 3rd with a public warning. the information from the hoover meeting meant little to us by the 24th, and it is true that the "new york times" story did say that tepper had been concerned about the virus earlier in february. lots of information flying back and forth. >> how about paul jones in dabos, what was that, january 22nd it was like keep an eye on this, because this could be big, and he told us, and we went wow. and i asked trump on the 22nd, i think it was, and really no one was talking about it at that point. in fact, the day before the ccp, the chinese communist party said there's no human-to-human transmission or i think they broached the possibility there could be human-to-human transmission and one person arrived in washington state that morning when i interviewed president trump and said what about this, it's totally under

control. paul tudor jones, a really smart guy, he brought that up to us and remember that was the first we heard of it. >> there were a lot of smart people that came on the air and talked about this earlier. you had members of the administration and the president himself publicly saying one thing and members of the administration saying something less than that on what seems like the same day. >> but kudlow is saying it's contained right now but in the future we don't know, i don't know, that doesn't seem like a smoking gun to me. i understand the thrust of the piece. >> right >> anyway, becky. >> thanks. when we return, new jersey governor phil murphy is joining us. >> and later we'll hear from trashy secretary steven mnuchin on stimulus talks and much more. "squawk box" will be right back.

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as the stimulus talks continue in d.c., the garden state announcing its plan to boost economic growth. let's welcome governor phil murphy of new jersey, nine ceos from around the state of new jersey, merck, johnson and john, veriz -- johnson & johnson. governor, thank you for joining us, you're looking well, chipper this morning. >> thank you, joe, so are you.

thap tha thanks for having me. >> so do you >> we'll get to another initiative in a second, it's long-term, but the issue of the day, we're still, we're like this whose fault is it, we're still like this, governor, and people could use something, the markets would probably take solace in that jay powell, chairman of the fed has begged for it. and we seem so close do you expect something to happen before the election >> i hope so, joe. i mean, we sure need it, and there was a narrative six months ago that this was a blue state thing or a legacy state thing, and thank god, unfortunately, the silver lining of this awful pandemic is it's an every state thing. we all need help and it's the smart thing to do it keeps people in jobs. it delivers services that are desperately needed in our hour of need. so i'm an eternal optimist, it

feels like it's gotten close i'm a huge believer in speaker pelosi i have had a lot of exchanges with her, a fair amount of exchanges with the treasury secretary. we need not just any deal, though, we need the right deal, and it has to go to the needs that are the most from the people who are suffering the most in this again, i'm an optimist, and i hope we get something soon. >> we're going to have mnuchin on a little bit later, the treasury secretary, governor, and just to drill down on what's happening. the gap has narrowed and there is a narrative from the white house and othersthatt the speaker doesn't want to give the president a win before election day, but i saw the speaker get really animated with wolf blitzer, who's like a pretty friendly guy, i think, normally to the cause, and it was just weird. it seems like both sides are

getting really defensive i just wish we could all get along. how far apart are we now we're not that far apart does it have to be perfect don't you think speaker pelosi should maybe not, or both, you know, i don't want to just focus on her, but the other side, both should be able to compromise on 300, whatever the difference is now? >> it doesn't have to be perfect, but it needs to be better than it is, and i'll let the treasury secretary i've known for 35 years speak for himself. listen, the speaker put the exact right bill on the table months ago so i don't in any way, shape, or form accept she's the one at fault here or she's trying to prevent something from happening before election day. this is politics from the other side with all due respect, joe, on this one. >> now that just sounds like the other side >> that doesn't help us move

forward. >> i'm calling balls and strikes, making my observations based on the facts she put this out in early summer. >> there's nothing in there that you might have a problem with if you were a republican because it's not involved with the matter at hand and it is a big number at this point, there shouldn't be things in there that aren't just front and center for trying to deal with the crisis. and you don't think there are. you're saying there aren't any things. >> i have not read into every detail i know new jersey needs state aid. every state does extension of unemployment benefits, spamall businesses, especially in restaurant and hospitality. there's a whole range of needs i was saying this in august, and the president has now been saying over the past few days. in august, something like this, you go big or go home, history will not be unkind if you over shoot. it will be if you under shoot. i couldn't believe it, but the republican senate went home

instead of going big now is the time to go big. it was the time earlier this summer it's not too late. but folks are desperate, and something has to get done, joe, and we have to stop playing politics and get this done. >> a potential future new jersey resident would like to get in now, govern. >> oh, please. >> hey, governor, it's andrew here i'm curious about one of the other big sticking points, and we want to talk to treasury secretary mnuchin about this later. pelosi's office saying this idea of a national testing strategy is still up for grabs. if that's really where there's a big debate and i'm curious as somebody who leads a state who may want to do it your own way, which is why i think one of the reasons why there's such a disparity here on this issue how you think about a national strategy versus a state strategy >> andrew, the welcome mat and the welcome gift basket is ready for you when you're ready to get

to jersey, by the way. listen, testing has been a challenge from day one, and we have found consistently common ground with the administration including recently on this binax instant turn around test for achieving that common ground on a whole range of areas, i'll be forever grateful, but we have lacked in national strategies, national face coverings, national masking i do think a national testing framework is still not just relevant it's still needed. again, the secretary of the trashy can speak for himself, but listen, i think his heart has been in the right place, and i think he's trying to get a deal done as well, i believe the politics is getting played largely on the senate side right now. >> is that it, andrew? tell me, governor, the latest on whether you see some of the troubling signs that we're seeing around the world, really. i mean, paris, in london, parts

of t of the united states and elsewhere, is new jersey susceptible to a problem in the fall that we have been worried about with the flu coming? >> we have come a long way, joe, but our numbers are up there's no question about it over the past several weeks, you know, we're regularly 700 to just under a thousand cases, new positives every day. there are hot spot, so i can't say that it's everywhere but there's a fair amount of community spread, and there's a developing consensus, and i'll quote bob redfield at the cdc that the town square is actually in reasonably good shape in the sense that in public when folks are going out, whether it's to dining or gatherings, that for the most part, folks are doing the right thing. it's in homes, in our private lives, in congregant living,

frat houses, you're inside and off lot of people living close to each other, and some amount of fatigue setting in. we have got to stay on the bull horn of social distancing, face coverings, washing your hands with soap and water, and if you're either not feeling well or you know you have been exposed to somebody, take yourself off the field and self-quarantine, and get tested. >> becky >> w.h.o. has come out and said that the governments really should be using shut downs as a first line of defense anymore. do you think we will go back to shut downs of schools, shut downs of businesses, shut downs of restaurants and bars again even in isolated places of the state. >> i hope not. i think we're less likely and please god that this is the case, we're less likely to use blunt instruments that we used in march and april when we shut the garage doors down and everything, and much more likely to use a scalpel and go into a

particular community or a particular, for instance, higher education has been a challenge so we've plussed up contact tracers, testing capacities into some communities, into the higher ed community. so i sure as heck hope if we're taking action that it's that scalpel as opposed to the blunt instruments we were using in the spring. >> tell me about the council and the plans that we talked about right at the top, the ceo council, governor. >> yeah, joe, this is really exciting we've had a restart, recovery commission for many months shirley tillman, former president of princeton, ken frasier, ceo of merck have led that great group of folks out of that has spun a ceo council as you rightfully pointed out that's grown to nine companies, cochaired by ken and charlie lowry, ceo of prudential in this group of their own, will came up is said you know what, we want to make a commitment to

hiring a certain amount of folks by the end of this decade who we otherwise would not have hired and have developed relationships with vendors to the tune of a big number with vendors that we otherwise would not have been doing business with. and in each case, it's a focus on hiring underserved communities, particularly community of color as well as diverse vendors, and it's a continuation, joe, of the theme we have talked about here before, the pandemic didn't create the inequities, but it's laid them bare and so this ceo council has stepped up with this commitment and if that weren't enough, they're actually now encouraging other companies to come in and hire an additional pool. so those nine companies have committed to 30,000 hires at the end of the decade, beyond what they would have done with the focus on under served communities, they are encouragi encouraging other companies to come in beyond 30,000 beyond

what they would have hired as well as that vendor commitment which ends up to be a half billion dollars of increment taal relationships with diverse suppliers. it's an exciting initiative. i take any hat off to these leaders and we're thrilled to unveil it today. >> that's awesome, great news, and quite a list, sorkin, not for nothing, but new jersey has obviously got something going for it think if we had all of those guests on on any given day, the ceos, if that was our squawk lineup, i mean, governor they see something in the garden state, do they not, some people may not appreciate >> no question about it. i mean, it's a who's who, and i can't say enough good things about them each and every one of them listen, we think of ourselves as the best place in america to raise a family number one public education system in america. best location in america best health care, outstanding

infrastructure quality of life. families get that and companies get that we work every day. we wear their presence as a badge of honor, work every day to earn their presence and earn their commitment and investment in our state >> governor, thank you you know, i've tried you know, i've stopped wasting my breath. becky gets it. but i've tried but thank you. >> oh, yeah! right, we'll continue to make the case but good to see you today, governor, thanks and good luck >> good to see you, joe. >> tough year. good luck. >> amen. thanks, joe. we've got some stories to tell you about. a lot of investors going to be talking about today, treasury secretary steven mnuchin say he and nancy pelosi remain far apart on a covid-19 relief package. a deal would be hard to reach before the november 3rd elections but mnuchin said he

would keep trying. the treasury secretary is going to join us live at 8:30 eastern time, a conversation you don't want to miss morgan stanley, beating analyst estimates on the top and bottom lines, helped by an 11% jump in investment banks revenue. morgan stanley completes the quarterly results for wall street's biggest banks we have seen mostly beats on analyst earnings and revenue estimates since tuesday and sticking with the bank theme, wells fargo, not a great headline they have fired 140 employees, alleging they defrauded the small business association economic injury disaster loan program set up to help small businesses throughout the pandemic shares of wells fargo, we'll show you rightnow, on that naew this morning as we flip the board around we have talked about the culture and reation arouputation around for some time. apple's iphone 12 launch

bringing 5g mobile service to the forefront this week. there are questions that remain over how fast the next generation networks will actually be as well as the time line for a widespread u.s. rollout. joining us right now to talk about what 5g will mean for american wireless customers is jeff mcelfresh, thanks for being here today it's good to see you, particularly given how much news there is around 5g right now. >> it's great to join you this morning, and i agree, this week has been an exciting week with apple's announcement on tuesday. it's an iconic moment, a milestone for our industry, and it comes at a really great time for at&t our customers and our network, which has never been stronger. i'm really pleased to share that ukla's speed test has rated at&t's nationwide 5g network ths fastest and i'm proud of the

engineers and the folks that have been hard in the trenches investing heavily in the infrastructure in this country and in nthis network as i'm sure you know, there's been a whole lot of noise this week that announcement certainly generated posturing from some of our competitors. we saw in the case of verizon in very dramatic fashion announced their nationwide 5g network, and i think if we're counting, that might be the third of three such networks in the u.s. and it neigh be frmay be from a t-mobie network, still second to at&t's 5g network there's a lot of confusion for consumers about what this means, and i think the real winner this week is the consumer it's the at&t customer, becky, and for us at at&t, you know, we're very pleased to announce that we introduced a very aggressive offer and something

that is far superior to any of that of our pierce in the industry, giving access to deals for both existing customers as well as new customers. it's a week where the consumer wins and at at&t, it's pretty simple, you get the nation's fastest 5g network on the best device at a very affordable applies, and that comes at an important time in our economy. >> jeff, obviously, just given some of the trash talk this morning, this is a big deal for all of the carriers involved in what's happening here. there have been some questions raised on wall street, though. i think craig mofette had a note he put out on tuesday saying he thinks it's a race to the bottom trying to win customers, and these are big give aways verizon said they are offering a free phone to new customers coming in. your offer is better, allowing a trade in for existing ones, new customers coming in for some of these things mofette just says the promotions

are so big that these are rather steep, $600 a phone. is that something that at&t can afford right now >> i think if you pay attention to what consumers want, they're looking for access to high quality networks and value in offer, and i remind you, this is a competitive marketplace and the dynamics that have played out over the past several quarters this year have proven that it's a very competitive market, and as we at at&t have a priority focus on establishing market momentum in our wireless franchise, we're bullish on this we see this as a long-term value play we've got a lot of loyal iphone customers. we launched the first iphone in the industry many moons ago and so we're actually in service of our customers creating a high quality experience and value that we think plays out in the long run >> so it's okay to spend the money now because you figure it's a long-term play for the

customers and you need to have them there with these phones >> yeah, that's correct. >> jeff, i know you've spent the majority of your career building and designing a lot of these communications networks. you were there when we went to 2 g, 3 g, 4 g, and now 5g, but there's a lot of confusion from consumers. jon fortt was making the case for and against getting an iphone part of the problem is in his neighborhood, he can't get the 4g lte, i have similar problems in my neighborhood what does that mean? am i going to be able to get 5g everywhere it sounds like the iphone will use it for some applications and not others. >> that's a great point. if you think about how the industry has evolved it's not a light switch it's not overnight as a network cover. 100% of every square mile in the world, it's a constant

investment, and improvement quarter over quarter and, we've got many customers today that are on 3g technology consumers take their opportunity to upgrade to the next and greatest device along the journey, and we think this will take some time we don't think this is going to be an overnight event and we're at the very beginning of what we believe to be an important upgrade cycle in the industry, noting that there's a lot of uncertainty in the economy, and how consumers feel about investing in other wireless service. we believe we've got a strong, compelling offer to help our local customers and any customer in the industry that would like to join the at&t family to ease them into the transition into a 5g experience. you're not going to have a 5g experience everywhere, but good news is at at&t, we've got the nation's fastest 4g network.

the speeds we offer our consumers are pretty impressive across the board. >> help us understand this, this goes to arthrotomiening inthrot. in large part because of the battery life we're not talking about the coverage issue unto itself how many years do you think we are away from phones using 5g consistently and persistently, and how much of that is going to be a function of the network coverage versus frankly, the power that's required? >> andrew, good morning, it's a good question. i think as we've learned in many of these technology upgrades, it takes an ecosystem of partners and providers, vendors, handset vendors, and it takes a cycle or two to perfect the software,

improve battery life and to improve accessing all of the capabilities of the network. we have capabilities like carrier aggregation, which gives us the potential to access multiple bands at the same time. and that, of course, does take a bit more of the battery life from the device, but as the engineers and software developers perfect those algorithms, we find extending of battery lives usually follow pretty quickly after major device launches. to answer your question specifically, i don't believe it's going to be too far out in the future you'll see a lot more pervasive 5g network access and pretty impressive battery lives for the consumer. >> jeff, thanks for joining us, and we would like to check in with you again, see how things are going as the phones get out and we start seeing orders. >> that would be great, becky, thanks for having me. >> thank you i'm going to be getting a

phone. i know jon fortt may not but i am coming up on the other side of this break, three more big news making interviews, we have the president of shopify we have treasury secretary steven mnuchin, straight off weekly jobless claims, and united airline ceo scott kirby, posting a $1.8 billion net loss for the third quarter. united is positioning itself for a long downturn in air travel due to the pandemic. stay tuned you're watching "squawk box" on cnbc we want to put money aside for them, so...change in plans. alright, let's see what we can adjust. ♪ we'd be closer to the twins. change in plans. okay. mom, are you painting again? you could sell these. lemme guess, change in plans? at fidelity, a change in plans is always part of the plan.

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welcome back to "squawk box," take a look at the futures right now. we are in the red. things have gotten worse at this point. you had red arrows across the board in europe where there's continued questions about whether there's going to be lock downs again. joe. andrew, thank you. online shopping events like amazon's prime day, which just wrapped up and big sales from walmart, target, and other retailers have helped ecommerce's fast growth. that's been especially true during the pandemic. there's another company that's reaping big benefits from the continued move towards online shopping shopify. it powers online stores for staples, heinz

i can't get to all of them, harley, there's a million other businesses, i'm at four. this could take a while. it's fared very well in the past seven months stock is up 200% since the market lows in march joining us president of shopify, and i mean, i hesitate to say lemonade out of lemons, but the world is insane how it works and the pandemic has accelerated a move that was already underway and i think that we just described how that's affected your great company. >> thanks. that's absolutely right, joe it's been amazing to watch what's happening here. it feels like the center of gravity from a retail perspective has shifted in store with an add on web site, to online, with multiple channels like retail, google, instagram,

facebook marketplaces like walmart, and connected by the retail system, shopify and online retail has nearly offset the 3.2% decline in brick and mortar spend, so what we're seeing here is an absolute boom in digitalization around commerce the other thing i don't think people are talking about is applications for new businesses in the third quarter in the united states is the highest they have been on record since four so we are seeing entrepreneurship as a way to survive and maybe thrive during the uncertainty, and we're doing everything we can at shopify to help empower more independent entrepreneurs to be really successful, and i think as we enter the holiday shopping season, that's never been more true. >> how does it look overall. for you, it's obviously great, but, you know, on a scale of one to ten, consumers, consumer confidence, everybody is dolieag with this in different ways.

it's not great for a lot of people it's by fifurcated. >> it is a tale of two retail worlds you have the resistant retailers that have not pivoted or adapted. you have so many of these resilient retailers that have done an amazing job. early signs, at least according to what we're seeing indicate that consumers are still very much shopping this holiday season, and that sales will last longer than ever before. we know that 77% of shoppers are planning to participate in the black friday cyber monday weekend, and they're going to spend the same or more than they did in 2019. we know that 55% of shoppers say they are only going to shop online during the black friday, cyber monday season. that's what the consumers are going to do. from a holiday shopping season perspective, black friday, cyber monday is no longer a season ening i think what is happening is they are purchasing with

purpose. they are transcending deal buster culture, trying to get great deals. they want to buy from companies and brands whose values align with theirs. they want to buy pjs from lounge and clothing from gym shark, and consumers are choosing to support black owned businesses, local merchants and socially and environmentally conscious brands and that's leading to a boon for independent brands and businesses. >> harley, if i bought your stock two or three years ago, why shouldn't i sell it right now because it just can't get any better >> well, look, i'm not going to give you stock advice, escrow, but what i will tell you shopify was viewed as an online store builder and people are realizing for the million and more stores on shopify, we are their work, their business, their retail operating system they come to us because they know that if you use shopify, they can compete against the biggest retailers in the world, capital, shipping providers, fulfillment providers.

we make it easy for them to compete with the biggest companies. shopify is an aggregate. instead of keeping the economies to scale for ourselves like a retailer would, we distribute them and that allows us to level the playing field for entrepreneurs and that's making it easier for them to be really successful now. >> females, too. you know, we're looking for ways of getting everybody involved in owning businesses and running businesses, and you've got some real bragging rights there for maybe people that in the past hadn't been represented quite as much >> that's right. absolutely it's been for a long time, entrepreneurship was out of touch, and frankly was out of the realm of possibilities for so many people, too expensive or too complicated we're trying to democratize entrepreneurship, everyone can do it and use it, and it's going to create jobs, economic prosperity, and more

equality we're proud of the we're doing at shopify. >> do you just do more are you just going to do more to double the stock from here or are you going to -- maybe you should get into a with, s or somethi - aws. can you keep doing more or do you have to do other things? >> the relationship that shopify has with those million and more stores is more than just a software provider. again, what i mentioned earlier, when they go to work or home office and open their laptop, where they spend their time is in the shopify dashboard, operating system we're trying to find pain points for entrepreneur ship. capital was a large one. for a long time, capital loans, cash advances, it wasn't available to so many small businesses we have given up more than a billion dollars of loans and cash advances. we're doing the same thing on the fulfillment side we want to democratize that as well we're trying to find the pain points of entrepreneur ship, and

reduce that barrier, and level the playing field so they can compete with the biggest companies and the best part about it is on the demand side, the consumers are agreeing that's how they want to buy. they want to buy from companies that have purpose, that have value, that have great quality product asks that's the reason why we're all walking around wearing tommy john underwear and bombas socks and amazing brands that were started and grown on shopify. >> i heard a boot and i see the university of ottawa coming out. anyway, it was good to have you on you are psyched about this company and what you do. it's good to see and it's exciting for entrepreneurs, it's not just about you, so it's good. thank you. >> thank you, joe. >> you're welcome, we'll see you again. becky. >> when we come back, treasury steak steven mnuchin brings us the latest on the state of the stimulus talks in washington is there a deal to be had or not? right now, though, as we head to a break, take a look at

the companies resuming their dividends after suspending them earlier this year. just this week, william sonoma, marathon oil, and car max all restarted their dividends. stay tuned "squawk box" will be right back. ah!

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coming up, breaking jobless claims data, instanteaio rctn from the treasury secretary, steven mnuchin stay tuned, "squawk box" coming right back

welcome back to "squawk box," we are just seconds away from initial jobless games plus new manufacturing data and the latest read on import prices we have been watching the futures this morning it's been two down days in a row for the markets after four up days in a row. the futures this morning are under quite a bit of pressure, dow futures, nasdaq futures down by 165 the s&p down by 38 rick santelli is standing by, and what are you seeing? are the numbers out? >> initial jobless claims moving higher but it is the 7th in a row in the 800,000 camp. 898,000, so only by 2,000 do we escape a new handle of 900,000 on continuing claims, some better news, we move from

10,976,000, to 10,018,000. that indeed is an improvement just like last week was an improvement. if we look at the other data points that are coming down, we see that 10.5 is the new read on empire that's an october read that follows the read of 17 and if we want to know what highest read is since covid hit with regard to that, well, 17.2 was it so you could see that we are backing away from some of our better reads now, let's go to philly fed, also an october number zoom, zoom, zoom, 32.3 that is multiples of the 15 we are expecting and that, indeed, is the best level going way back to february where it was a little bit over 36 now, let's look at import prices on the month over month, up 3/10 exactly as expected. petroleum up 7/10. hotter than expected and if we look at year over year, minus 1.1. that's very important to

understand the nearby deferred, it's going to be the same way with regard to inflation expectations down the road, and export prices up 6/10, double expectations so to summarize, jobless claims, initial not as good as we were expecting. continuing claims, a nice improvement. andrew, back to you. >> rick, thank you for that. meantime earlier on the show we spoke with walmart ceo doug mcmillon >> i do think some level of stimulus now and maybe even in the future that's really targeted, sensible, pragt cactil may be needed to address the separation in the economy. there are americans that need them that don't care about what's happening in politics, aren't completely tied up in this election, and they just need some help. >> joining us right now on the

squawk news line is treasury secretary mr. steven mnuchin, we appreciate you joining us this morning. you heard what doug mcmillon had to say, we listened to the comments you made yesterday about the idea that no deal is likely before the election what do you say to the taxpayers and citizens that don't care about politics, they care about putting money in their pocket at a time of such challenge >> let me first clarify. what i said was that a deal would be hard to get done before the election, but we're going to keep trying. i don't want to say that it's not likely it's just there are significant issues i couldn't agree more with doug. doug just said what we need now is targeted, insensible approach, and really our first choice is there's $300 billion of money left from the last

c.a.r.e.s funding. our priority is to spend that money immediately, $130 billion in the ppe program with congressional approval, we could send second payments to small businesses that were hurt that have declining revenues the airline industry was forced into major layoffs at no fault of their own because of covid. we have money leftover that could do more payroll support so the airlines could hire those people back. we would have passed with a bipartisan overwhelming approval, airlines deal, ppe deal, the speaker has refused to do that. her all or nothing approach doesn't make sense for the american public and politics are getting in the way but the president and i are determined to keep working on a larger, comprehensive deal. >> mr. secretary, one of the comments that we have heard from the speaker or issues on the

table that seems to be a problem or challenge on both sides is a national testing strategy. can you speak to what's happening here it sounds like the democrats are asking for $75 billion, republicans, $45 billion, i think there's more to this. >> that issue is getting overblown. we have agreed to $178 billion overall for health it's an extraordinary amount of money. we agreed with the democrats $75 billion going to testing, ka contact tracing. i think quite frankly, we won't need to spend that money, we're happy to take the money, and $25 billion for vaccines and distribution, which is important to continue our project warp speed. what we have been focused on is the language around testing. we had proposed a bipartisan

bill that has the support in the senate and house to go forward with testing but quite frankly when i speak to pelosi today i'm going to tell her that we're not going to let the testing issue stand in the way we'll fundamentally agree with their testing language subject to minor issues. this issue is being overblown. we need to get money to the american public now, the people nasc that are most hurting. >> you have been reticent to really blame the other side in terms of calling this politics this is really i think one of the first times we have heard you use those words. others have and you haven't in large part because you're negotiating. does that suggest the talks are breaking down that may be worse than we understand >> no, i wouldn't interpret that, let me put this in perspective. first of all, we had congress

act in an unprecedented way with $3 trillion of funding i mean, if you look at that relative to gdp on a global basis, our response was extraordinary, and i have to say i couldn't be more proud of the fact that we had complete support in the senate, 96-0, 100-and passed in the house to overwhelming support people put politics aside, we got this done and executed and that's why the economy is coming back today it was really an extraordinary act of everybody coming together i think unfortunately politics has gotten in the way now. we have been negotiating for over two months with the speaker and senator schumer. we do need bipartisan support. we can't do this alone, so i will continue to negotiate until we can get a deal done that makes sense. but as i said, i don't see any logical reason at this point with three weeks to the election

why we can't move forward and agree on the $300 billion that we have left it's sitting in the treasury bank account, ready to go. it was money that was appropriated last time so i guess the only explanation is that you know, she is holding out for an all or nothing. whether you want to call that politics or something else, it's unfortunate, but we're going to keep trying. >> mr. secretary, it does sound like you are willing to give on a lot of things that the democrats have asked for but mitch mcconnell is not in the room speaker pelosi is there. chuck schumer is there does mitch mcconnell have his party on wing, his senators able to sign off on some of the things that you have said that you would be willing to concede or is this going to have to be very heavily done with the democrats in the senate with just a few republicans coming along? >> well, let me be very clear.

mark meadows and i are speaking to the president daily, and i'm not communicating anything to the speaker without having the president and mark meadows on board. we are also speaking to kevin mccarthy and mitch mcconnell on a regular basis. mark and i had a two-hour conference call with the senate republicans over the weekend i think there are certain areas where there's complete agreement on the senate side i think you know what we call the targeted bill had overwhelming support that is the priority of the senate mitch agreed that he'll bring the ppe back to the floor to try to get that done hopefully the democrats won't hold that up but we are moving forward and we are seeking input from everybody. >> mr. secretary, i also wanted to ask you, i just wanted to come back to this testing question i know you're saying this it's not a deal breaker would the administration be willing to support a stand alone

national testing strategy bill in the same way that you would for the airline, for example, or some of the other issues >> i think we would combine that with ppe deal and an airlines deal so again, we wouldn't move forward with testing without getting money for small business i think you know that's virtually half of the private payroll. and these small businesses, no fault of their own, and by the way, let me just say, we have a national testing strategy at the moment the national testing strategy -- and mark meadows has been enormously involved in this, working throughout the administration i think you know we have over 150 million of the buy next now tests that we have at $5 a test, incredibly economic. we are distributing those to nursing homes in schools we're getting those out. we signed another major contract with a company that has a 98% rating from the mayo clinic that will be, again, tests that can

be done in 20 iminutes. we'll be using those in conjunction with binex now also, the administration moved forward with an extraordinary project warp speed on vaccines we've funded manufacturing of seven different vaccines so we still have money for testing, money for vaccines, we would like more but the president has executed through us, you know, dramatic spending on vaccines and testing. and by the way, 60 days ago, the technology was not there for a $5 rapid test. >> mr. secretary, i wanted to ask you about a headline in the news today, "the new york times" reporting that members of the administration, including larry kudlow had spoken to some donors and other investors through the

hoover institution about the state of play. this is back on february 24th. and apparently made clear their own concerns about covid in a way that was different than the way the president had made his concerns public, virtually on the same day, clearly from the memos that seemed to go back and forth, certainly people took from that away that there were going to be problems and went ahead and made different investment decisions are you concerned about that >> well, let me first say, i saw the headline this morning. this is the first i've seen of it it wouldn't be the first time i've seen a headline out of "the new york times" that exaggerated things or puts them in a wrong perspective. i have had my own personal attacks from the "new york times" doing this to me. you know, i can't imagine this occurred -- by the way, there were plenty of investors who had their own views of what was

going on at the time and were very concerned, rightfully so, quite frankly, had we not gone through the with the c.a.r.e.s package, you wouldn't have seen a market recovery instability. at the time, i think as you know, we were expecting companies like boeing having to borrow from the government is really the fact that we were able to stand up with the fed 13 different facilities to support the market most of them didn't need to be used, that helped with the rebound. but my guess is this is another exaggeration out of "the new york times." >> mr. secretary, the wells fargo news today, i mean, i guess it's, you know, i'm glad they made that movie casablanca, because we use it all the time, that we're shocked, shocked that something is going on. it looks like there was some fraudulent activity in some of the relief funds designed for the pandemic and that's always going to happen. do you think this is what we saw at wells fargo, tip of the

iceberg or common and could you -- do you have an idea about what percentage of the funds that went out were, you know, not used as effectively as they would have been or actually fraudulently obtained? >> well, i don't think it's the tip of the iceberg, and quite frankly, i was surprised as well by the number of people involved in warells fargo i'm glad the doj got to the bottom of this quickly i assume wells fargo's management cooperated and that's why they were able to quickly review this and get rid of these people it is quite unfortunate. i will say we are working with the sba on the audit program i think as you know, we've committed on all loans of 2 million and higher they will go through a third party review sba has hired a contractor to do this, and this process is starting to make sure that all of the people that took the money used it properly, provided the proper documentation, and

then on loans below $2 million, it will go through a statistical review there's some ai intelligence we're using to look for fraud prevention, but similar to how the irs audits, so unfortunately in any program that you get out quickly, there's some add actors out there, and i think we'll catch them. >> so if you believe what some people believe, and you kind of referenced it, and that is that the democrats will not give this administration a win before election day on stimulus, do you feel like you're on a fool's errand are you doing it for -- why keep trying do you ever just say i'm going home i'm not going to do this anymore or do you really think it's possible that they would give a win to you >> let me be very clear, president and i and mark meadows and the entire administration are not giving up on the hard working american public. there are too many people that lost their jobs because of

covid. i think we've made a remarkable economic recovery, unemployment is way down. but it's still too high, and the president has made very clear to us, until we get every single person back to work, our job is not done, and no, we won't give up fighting for the american public who has been hurt by this i hope the democrats seriously consider letting us spend the $300 billion i can literally get the money out the door this week, and by the way, you know, if they would approve stand alone checks, which is mostly direct deposits, we could get that money out quickly as well. so no, the president and i and others are not giving up >> okay. mr. treasury secretary, we appreciate you joining us this morning as always, and we will watch and look forward to your progress and hope to talk to you again very very soon. >> terrific. thank you. >> thank you let's get jim cramer's take

on all of this, over at cnbc headquarters jim, what do you think what was the most important point that the secretary just made >> well, i mean, if there's 300 billion, and i know there is, i mean, that's just, one, just get that out right now i have been analogizing there's four lanes to this highway three of them are fantastic. the fourth is bumpy, and people are getting in wrecks and it's got potholes, and we know what business they're in, the hospitality, restaurants, target that money take the 300 and target that money. and get those people to have food on the table. and then let's negotiate something big. but this shouldn't be held up. the 300 billion should just be sent targeted to people whom everybody knows needs it something bigger, okay, if you want to weigh in after the election, that's fine. there are a lot of people who as soon as it gets cold and i talk to a lot of restaurants, associates of restaurants because i'm in it, and it's going to get cold in about three weeks, so all of these great

efforts to be outside, which are around the concernuntry, by the, those can be shut down, and that's when you're going to need the money, and there's just this kind of unrealistic, both sides, really, unrealistic i think of how we've got to get the money to the people. secretary mnuchin who's pushing for small business could easily, easily persuade people on this one side because i guess the big deal is not going to happen. doesn't impact the market if it's small but it does impact people's lives compassionate use. >> right >> exactly we are seeing the markets down, third day in a row if this continues, and by the way, we were down all morning but took another leg down after the initial jobless games were higher than anticipated. what do you think is driving this the stimulus stuff may be nothing new in that. there are a lot of other headlines people are watching. >> there's this one stock that typifies this market, and it's called fastly, and fastly is a

company that involves fast internet and preannounced a difficult neurological a lot of that might have been tiktok, i think it makes people pause, maybe we're paying too much for tech stocks i don't think that's true. tech is going to be fairly valued and it's going to be a great opportunity to buy i totally understand that, look, it is just nervous ahead of the election and none of the bank earnings, as usual, becky, made anyone field well, which is ridiculous goldman's quarter was great. morgan stanley's quarter was great. i could argue that jp morgan did a good job bank of america was fine it's not enough. here's schaub with a decent quarter, walgreens with a decent quarter. that's supposed to happen when a meteor hits the united states, and i just see a lot of good, but i say let it come down, and do some buying i have been bearish but this is not the sometime to get wholesale negative it's just not. >> a lot of good in the bank

earnings. >> yeah. >> a lot of good in the bank earnings and other things we're hearing too, but earnings at this point are backward looking, everyone is worried about what happens right now and in the next three weeks, six weeks, twelve weeks, i think it's hard. >> becky, some of these guys change their models so much that they just are not a day to day business goldman isn't day to day morgan stanley isn't but they are viewed as if they are some sort of bad community banks. and it is just -- it is very unnerving to watch all the changes that gorman put through and solomon put through. it means nothing these are value ridiculous they're ridiculously valued. goldman should not be -- i'm saying, you got to buy this stock. goldman and morgan stanley, they are not the same companies that they were three years ago. >> jim, thank you. >> absolutely. great to talk to you >> see you in a few minutes. >> thank you. >> you too when we come back, the "squawk box" exclusive with united

airlines ceo scott --kirby. don't go initiate. we'll be right back. hey, dad! hey, son! no dad, it's a video call. you got to move the phone in front of you like... like it's a mirror, dad. you know? alright, okay. how's that? is that how you hold a mirror? [ding] power e*trade gives you an award-winning mobile app with powerful, easy-to-use tools and interactive charts to give you an edge, 24/7 support when you need it the most plus $0 commissions for online u.s. listed stocks. don't get mad. get e*trade and start trading today. to a world that must keep turning. the world can't stop, so neither can we. because the things we make, help make the world go round. they make it cleaner, healthier, and more connected.

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united airlines, wider than expected loss for the third quarter. over to phil lebeau who joins us

now with a special guest >> let's bring in united ceo scott kirby joining us from the united club at the phoenix airport. scott, i know it is early morning there, but you had a chance to get a sense of where the state of the business is over the last three months what is your sense as we head into what might be a second wave of covid-19 building around the country? >> yeah, well, good morning, phil thank you for having me. from the beginning of this crisis, united focused on being realistic about the outlook, going all the way back to the end of february. we thought the possible course -- the trajectory of the virus would play out like it has. and that helped us prepare and went through the second quarter and the third quarter and proud of the united team we led the industry in all the revenue metrics,smallest decline in -- best increase in cargo revenue, smallest decline in loyalty now we're kind of at this point where we think we can see the light at the end of the tunnel it is a long tunnel.

it is going to have ups and downs. it is going to take widely available vaccine, probably the end of next year, but we have now turned the corner. we have gotten through the initial phase of the crisis. and we think we have turned the corner and can see it. it is still a long way off we're going to see continued recovery in demand won't get back anywhere close to normal until there is a widely available vaccine. but we see the path through to the end. >> so let's bring up the question of getting back to break even you all in, burning $25 million a day at the end of the third quarter. when do you get to zero? what do you get to break even? >> so it really depends on the recovery and demand. and that is anyone's guess what i can say with confidence, though, is on an apples to applappl s basis, i'm confident we'll continue to lead in each quarter. we're going to be the first to return to cash flow positive i'm not sure when that will happen we tended to be a little more conservative, perhaps, but it

turned out to be more realist i on the forecast of demand. our real forecast would be a little to the right of where some others are. but what i am confident about is that an apples to apples basis we'll be the first and i think the bigger point is, cash burn is a metric we use to start looking at can airlines or other companies survive, do you have enough liquidity? as we're turning the corner, cash burn is probably not the right metric to be looking at. we're really able to now start focusing on the recovery, which is in 2022 and beyond. we look forward to getting back to cash flow positive at some point next year. >> scott, i'm not sure if you heard the treasury secretary right before you, he was talking about the need for passing some type of a stimulus package, including another $25 billion in payroll support for the airlines you furloughed 13,000 workers, if some type of a bill comes through, let's say in the next three weeks, a month, whatever it is, will you then bring those 13,000 back on to the payroll? >> yeah, i did hear secretary

mnuchin and i have spoken to him several times in last couple of months as well as speaker pelosi it is amazing. there is strong bipartisan support, house, senate, white house, across the board, for a second round for airlines, c.a.r.e.s. 2 for airlines. it is important for us, for our employees, and also important for the economy and the ultimate rebound and the ultimate recovery in the economy. and we hope that something passes at some point, i recognize it is three weeks before an election, so politics makes it difficult in the short-term we hope something passes and we will absolutely look forward to bringing those 13,000 employees back earlier than we were otherwise going to be able to. >> scott, we're running up against the top of the hour. we got to wrap up the interview. your thoughts on southwest saying it plans to add flights at o'hare and down at houston international, those are your -- two of your on them saying they want to take

you on. >> new point to point service to florida, four new destinations in ind wia and africa, we have been working hard behind the scenes, and we have great network, great customer service, great customer loyalty at o'hare and intercontinental and the biggest disadvantage we had before the pandemic against southwest was change fees and we have eliminated change fees permanently for domestic travel. i feel really good about our ability to compete at those two airports >> and scott, one last question here just it reiterate, a second wave of covid cases seems to be building around the country. if we see more quarantines and lockdowns, how much does that weigh on business as you head into the holiday season? >> well, quarantines and lockdowns are certainly harmful. we do see an increase in cases i hope that as a country, as a society, as a world, will use masks in particular. there are a lot of things we can do and can do safely, including

lots of information out today on the safety of flying on airplanes. a lot of things we can do safely finding ways to use testing. today we start testing for flights to hawaii, first flights to hawaii. using testing as a way to open up parts of the economy that would otherwise continue to be closed, because there are -- as secretary mnuchin said, parts of the economy really hurting now and they need help we can do it safely, particularly if we use testing to open up parts of the economy. >> scott kirby, ceo of united airlines joining us exclusively this morning from phoenix and the united club there. you heard it they're not giving a commitment in terms of when they get back to break even, but they believe that they will be there perhaps a little more conservative than what we hear from other airlines saying in the spring. >> lots to -- a lot still up in the air. a lot still up in the air, phil, in pun intended. none of us know what the future is going to bring, which is not a very profound statement. thank you, phil.

a quick -- the futures, looks like down -- is it out i don't know third straight day of downward movement in the dow. 320 is -- we'll see what happens to the rest of the session down 175 on the nasdaq and oil is down, so it is kind of across the board. guys, we'll see you tomorrow guys and gals. becky, i like the purple, purple is good. "squawk on the street" is next good thursday morning, welcome to "squawk on the street." i'm carl quintanilla with jim cramer and david faber it is risk off this morning. stocks on track for the first three day-loss since mid-september as daily global covid cases hit a new record europe introduces new lockdowns. hospitalizations in this country near a two-month high. and stimulus hopes remain thin, jobless claims go the wrong direction up 53 k. road map begins with stimulus hope